Movie PoA Foreshadows Books 6 & 7

[submarimon15]

No: HPFGUIDX 104262

> Katie now:
> 
>    Am I correct in saying that there's no Remus-Lily stuff at all 
in 
> the books? Very possibly I'm forgetting something, but I don't 
> recall him ever mentioning her. Is this JKR's doing, or Steve 
Kloves?
>    (The conspiracy theorist in me thinks this might be a 
> diversionary tactic to overshadow the Sirius/Lupin subtext. But 
> maybe that's just me.)
> 
> sincerely hoping that we won't learn about a Remus/Lily affair in 
> book six,
>   Katie

Mike:

There's no Remus/Lily stuff mentioned in the books that I can recall 
without reading from PoA to OotP over specifically looking for these 
things. 

How exactly would this be an affair? I also 'think' it's ever 
mentioned when James and Lily started dating (I know it was 
mentioned somewhere that they got married right after they 
graduated). It could be that there was a bit of a Lily/Remus 
relationship going on before she ended up picking James over Remus?

Ok, now the part where I go off on some theories :)

1) Remus and James both loved Lily

-The movie seems to foreshadow this, and we really haven't heard too 
much about Lily's past, though according to JKR we'll learn some 
more stuff in Book 7.
-Perhaps it was a competition between Remus and James to see who 
could get Lily? Somewhat of a crazy theory, but let's face it, they 
were teenage boys competing over a popular(most likely) and 
beautiful girl and this is quite common.
-Lily picks James over Remus because he has the courage to save 
Snape from Sirius' prank? (This can be interperted as cowardice for 
not being able to go through with the plan, but for the sake of this 
theory it will be considered courage to stand up to Sirius and stop 
him from making a large mistake).

This comes down to a quote (and completely true statement) made in 
PS/SS.

"There are all kinds of courage," said Dumbledore, smiling. "It 
takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, but just 
as much to stand up to our friends. I therefore award ten points to 
Mr Neville Longbottom." -Dumbledore, pg 221 PS paperback, Canadian
(british?) edition.

I've always liked this quote based on it's truth. It's an excellent 
little life lesson being thrown in at the end of the novel. What IS 
interesting is that bravery and courage are valued and the most 
notable trait for Gryffindors.

How does this fit in with the Remus/James competition you ask? Well, 
we find out in OotP that Remus was made Prefect so that he 
could "control James and Sirius" (not the exact quote, don't have my 
OotP with me, but it's in the second half of the Prefect party 
chapter). Later in Snape's pensieve we see that Remus only sits back 
and watch's Sirius and James torment Snape. We can learn from this 
that Remus doesn't have the courage to truly stand up to his 
friends. We can tell that he's particularly for humiliating Snape as 
he doesn't join in, but he doesn't even do his Prefect duties to 
stop this either. Surprise surprise, it's Lily who has to come break 
up the humiliation. 

Where I'm going with this, is that if Remus and James were the two 
eligible love interests in Lily's life, what sets them apart? James 
has the courage to save someone's life that he's hated for the past 
5 years (at least, depending on what year at school the prank 
happened). In the end, James and Lily get together and leave Remus 
in the dust as they quickly get married after finishing their 7 
years at Hogwarts, and then immediately give birth to Harry.

Conclusion based on the "Bridge seen" in the PoA movie: Remus and 
James both loved Lily, James' extra characteristics, such as 
Gryffindor bravery makes him the top choice for Lily, Remus is left 
off in the side again. This brings us to....

2) ESE!Lupin all over again, but with some different motives.

I'm going to assume that all of you have seen this theory around the 
boards many times so I'm not going to go over the whole thing, just 
add in the extra bits.

-James beats Remus in the "Lily's boyfriend" ladder. Teenage angst 
easily comes into this. 

After graduation:
James and Lily have each other, and they both keep close ties to 
Sirius during this time. The war is still going on mind you.

Sirius believes Remus might be connected with Voldemort and the 
DE's. He admits this in the Shrieking Shack scene on PoA (The novel) 
where Remus apologizes to him for thinking he actually did betray 
James and Lily as well as kill Peter.

Peter just hung around with them, there's no evidence to support 
either way that they were actually close friends.

We have Remus being shunned from the Wizarding world due to the fact 
he's a werewolf and then being shunned from his friends because they 
believe he's a traitor, oh, and James just stole the one person he 
cared for and admired greatly (and possibly the only one who loved 
him as more than just a friend).

Theory: James and Lily are getting paranoid now that they've been 
marked by Voldemort and the DE's as targets. Sirius proposes a 
radical idea of making Peter secret keeper instead of himself. James 
and Lily choose Remus based on this evidence alone depsite not 
knowing his or anyones true allegiance. 

Peter goes over to Voldemort and gives him some information anyways, 
hence why he goes into hiding. He truely believes Sirius DID kill 
James and Lily; he fakes his own death to hide from Sirius because 
he believes Sirius has lost it and is coming for him too. Sirius 
believes Peter actually betrayed them. Peter never openly admits 
that he was or wasn't secret keeping in the PoA shrieking shack 
scene (he mumbles).

Lupin is outcasted from his friends and the entire WW and is 
peticularly bitter that James beat him in the competition for Lily 
(I'm sorry that I'm making this whole Love thing sound like a 
complete and childish game, but I'm just trying to make it more 
basic). He's given the keys to James in peticular, the DE's find him 
because they knew he was close with the Potter's and he figures he 
has nothing to lose. He gives them the info. Voldemort takes him 
along to GH, he's already killed James before he enters GH with 
Lupin. Lupin realizes what he's done upon seeing Lily trying to 
protect Harry, tells her to run (Lupin's surprise about Harry 
telling him he heard James' voice). Lily protects Harry at the cost 
of her life, you know the rest.

Yikes! That was way way longer than I had originally thought, but 
then I just started typing and typing... well I'm sure some of you 
know how that is. Here's a quick summary and how it relates to the 
movie:

a. The Bridge scene where Lupin and Harry discuss his parents shows 
that Lupin is more interested in Lily than James. 

b. The lack of hearing a male's voice in during Harry's dementor 
induced memories. I mean come on, this is a movie here. If we heard 
a voice we'd be able to tell if it's Remus/Snape rather than 
somebody we've never heard speak before (James).

c. The Fidelus charm is left out. Well, if all the Secret Keeper 
points were kept in the movie, it would come down to finding out who 
the secret keeper is in the Shrieking Shack scene. Peter dodges this 
question mysteriously by mumbling in the novel, but while reading 
this would seem normal and we may not pick up on it the first, 
second or even third times through. If Peter were to be asked that 
question in the movie, then mumble, we'd catch it right away and it 
would be completely obvious that things aren't what they seem.

Actually these theories probably deserve a post of their own, but 
unless someone actually shows some interesting in the James/Remus 
love competition theory I wont bother making a seperate topic for it.

Mike, who is happy to finally post his first theoryish post after 
only reading for quite a while :).